


As Empty Now as at the First Note

by domesticadventures



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Coda, Gen, Headspace, Hopeful Ending, M/M, POV Dean Winchester, Post-Episode: s15e18 Despair, Requited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-09
Updated: 2020-11-09
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:01:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,231
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27463120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/domesticadventures/pseuds/domesticadventures
Summary: Dean takes stock. This is what he has left: one incomplete picture, a bloody handprint, a decade plus of regrets, and two other people in the whole world to wait with him until God finally calls their numbers.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 26
Kudos: 467
Collections: SPN Finale "Destiel is CANON" Collection





	As Empty Now as at the First Note

**Author's Note:**

> the inspiration for this, other than the general insanity of being Extremely Online during the past hundred or so hours, is [this story](https://themoth.org/stories/the-house-of-mourning), which i first heard on the moth podcast years ago and still think of often. the subject matter is difficult -- it's about people tending to the bodies of their friends and family who have died -- but it's so incredibly tender and full of love. i promise it's worth 15 minutes of your time to give it a listen.

_You want to see my hands?  
As empty now as at the first note.  
Or was the point always  
to continue without a sign?_

-“Matins,” Louise Glück

* * *

Dean has seen Cas die before.

He has watched Cas fall to the floor, has carried one last soiled scrap of all that he was in his trunk for months, hoping for a sign. He has held Cas’ face in his hands, praying for a miracle. He has knelt on his knees in the sand, has prepared Cas’ body and watched it burn.

But he has not experienced something like this before. There’s always been something he could do, some last tender act, a final goodbye. An apology for words left unsaid, things left undone. He’s always had something to hold onto, to turn over in his hands to remind him: this was real, it happened, it meant something.

He doesn’t know what to do with this. What do you do when someone is just gone?

—

 ** _I’m not dead_** , he texts Sam.

He could sense the panic in Sam’s barrage of texts, his missed calls, just like he can feel his relief in the speed with which he replies, **_Thank God._**

And then, a second later, three in rapid succession:

**_Uh._ **

**_I mean._ **

**_You know what I mean._ **

**_Yeah,_** Dean sends, and pulls himself up off the floor.

— 

He ignores the buzzing of his phone in his pocket, text after text after text, as he walks the silent hallways, makes his way to his room.

It doesn’t take him long to find the answer he was looking for. This is what he has, the sum total of what he could show someone if they asked him for proof that Cas existed, that he wasn’t just a product of Dean’s wishful thinking: a single photograph sitting on his nightstand.

He remembers exactly how he felt when he took it, the way his heart had raced when he put the cowboy hat on Cas’ head, when he insisted on getting a picture for posterity. He had taken too long setting up the shot, making sure he was getting the lighting just right, the pose, Cas’ earnest, serious expression. He had wanted something more than the single picture he snapped; another of Cas from head to toe, maybe, to get the full effect, or maybe of both of them together in their ridiculous getups. But he had let it go after just the one—he doesn’t think Cas would have minded being held up a little longer, but he had been sure he was giving himself away.

He thumbs at the edge of it as he finally checks his phone. He has dozens of messages from Sam, an explanation in staccato bursts: their failed plans, their friends turned to ash. The empty roads, the abandoned towns. A world with no monsters, no heroes, no people left to save. All of it gone.

 ** _Can you text me every now and then?_** Sam asks. **_Just so I know you’re still there._**

Dean takes stock. This is what he has left: one incomplete picture, a bloody handprint, a decade plus of regrets, and two other people in the whole world to wait with him until God finally calls their numbers.

—

He hands Cas the mixtape and he says _I love you,_ he sits across from him in a diner and he says _I love you,_ he kneels on the floor with blood on his face and Cas’ hand reaching for his cheek and he says _I love you,_ he hands Cas his balled-up trenchcoat and he says _I love you,_ he wraps Cas in a hug at the side of a river and he says _I love you,_ he kneels in prayer and he says _I love you._

 _I love you, too,_ Dean says, and Cas’ look is soft and surprised in a way he’s seen a hundred times before. Dean reaches for him, and the empty oozes up from the floor, crawls up Cas’ legs and torso and neck and into his smiling mouth and—

Dean jerks awake to find his phone ringing, winces as he shifts in his chair and something in his neck pops. He swipes to decline the call and texts Sam instead, **_I’m still here._** He adds, **_Dozed off. Sorry._**

 ** _It’s okay,_** Sam says. **_We’ll be there soon._**

—

“Dean,” Sam says, bounding down the stairs, stopping once he’s fully in the room. He frowns as he looks at Dean, back towards the library, down the hallway. “Where’s Cas?” he asks, and Dean wants to curl up and die all over again.

He swallows against the burning in his throat, behind his eyes, and mutely shakes his head.

It’s Jack’s voice cracking as he says, “He’s gone?” that breaks him.

Sam is there in two long strides, pulling Dean from his chair, wrapping him in a hug so tight it makes his joints creak. And then Jack is there, too, all of them wrapped around one another, a tangled mess of humanity.

Here they are, the last life in the universe, all of the world’s grief concentrated in this one room, the only proof that there was ever that much love to lose. It hurts so much that Dean can barely believe it, given the life he’s lived.

—

It takes a lot more time and a lot more alcohol than he’d like to tell Sam what happened. He manages it shakily, haltingly, a few words at a time.

“What did you say?” Sam asks.

“I didn’t say it back,” Dean says, not meeting his eyes. “I didn’t even get to say goodbye.”

“Would you rather not have known?”

Sam’s voice is so soft, so quiet—maybe the last voice Dean will ever hear—and he hates what he recognizes in it. Hates how vividly he remembers what it had been like, having Eileen in the bunker, the way she and Sam had seemed so full of life and love that it had poured off of them in waves, catching Dean off guard, knocking his feet out from under him. Hates that the last he saw of her was her abandoned bag, her phone, the lock screen set to a picture of Sam with his hands raised in a helpless gesture, as if to say, _You need a picture of me? What for?_

Dean thinks long and hard about it. Thinks about all the times people have told him they loved him and he hadn’t believed it, had seen too clearly the disconnect between words and actions, between who he is and who he wishes he could have been. About all the people who had never said anything to him at all. It had been just one item on a long list of uncertainties.

He hasn’t had a great track record with seeing silver linings, lately. But he knows how deals work, he understood the terms. If it had ended any other way, he would probably already have given up. But instead, here he is, knowing that against all odds, against all reason, against the heaviness of his own heart, he’s going to keep going. He wants it all, the saying and the having.

“No,” he says. “Would you?”

“No,” Sam says. “Wouldn’t trade it for anything.”

Here’s what Dean has: his empty hands, the absolute certainty that Cas loves him, and one last fight to win.

**Author's Note:**

> [here's](https://domesticadventures.tumblr.com/post/634269802514497536/) the tumblr version if that's your thing!


End file.
